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I settled into my chair, and tried put some food in my stomach. Maybe if I had something to steady me, it wouldn’t feel like my stomach took a dive every time Adrian’s touches and words landed on my skin as if they were genuine instead of for what they were—crafted.

Uma brought Sebastian up to the stage for a quick speech, which toed the line of a self-servingdeclaration of his godly prowess and an ode to the arts. His confidence did have a tendency to turn towards cockiness, from what I’d seen.

I didn’t even want to picture how he’d act if there was a Roman version of Apollo in the picture. There was never a good explanation for why one had never popped up, it was always just Apollo.

Maybe I’d ask Adrian, now that I had his perspective.

As if summoned by my thoughts, Adrian leaned down to speak right in my ear. I certainlydid notpay any mind to the shiver that ran across my skin at the deep caress of his voice. “In case you were curious, there was quite a generous donation in both our names given today.”

“Smart.” I had to pick between two evils, sitting this close to him. Either losing my vision and making the sound of his voice more powerful, or moving my head back to make eye contact and confronting the fact that our faces were mere inches apart. I chose the second option. “That’s a big step. People might think we’re crazy for moving so fast.”

“Nothing is crazy in the face of true love,” Adrian deadpanned.

“True love that has an expiration date of three months,” I reminded him. All of our displays of passion and love would probably look like a flame that didn’t have enough wax to survive at the end of this.

“Those are your terms,” Adrian countered, eyes narrowing. “If I had it my way, you’d never be rid of me.”

“Barely a week are you’re already proposing marriage?” I could have sworn a literal lightning bolt flashed across his eyes at the wordmarriage.“Might as well just elope at this point.”

And when a twin lightning bolt joined the first, I had to add. “That wasnotan offer.” Marriage after a week of knowing each other would take thiswaytoo far, far enough that my father was likely to consider me criminally insane and revoke the offer to lead his businesses in the first place. “Down boy.”

Adrian chomped his teeth lightly at me, a playful return to my scolding. It forced a shocked laugh from my chest, a touch too loud.

Several eyes snapped to us, some curious and some chastising. No matter how new the love, it was still rude to focus entirely on each other and not on the event taking place right in front of us.

It wasn’t my fault Adrian was so potent, I wanted to defend. Anyone who spent even a minute in his presence would get wrapped up in him. Even harder when you were already entangled.

Our arms were intertwined, his hand resting over mine where I’d placed it on his leg. Close enough to his knee to keep it appropriate for public, but an intimate enough touch to make people think what we wanted them to—that we were so enthralled with one another that the thought of not touching, even for a moment, seemed unthinkable.

The image we were curating was important. It was what we came here for.

And yet it was hard to remind myself of that when a deep feeling of restlessness started curling low in my belly. It was a full body vibration, not unlike the urge to get out of my head and run until my limbs gave out.

It took everything in me not to curl in the fingers resting on his thigh, anything to distract from the hard muscle of his quad. I recrossed my legs to hide myfidget, but two people’s eyes shot to me.

A consequence of being watched with an intensity far greater than what I was used to.

And a consequence of realizing that we’d relaxed into that position. Yes, we’d talked about freely touching in public and for show. But we hadn’t discussed how or in what manner.

We’d just sat down anddonethis. Entirely natural.

One of the onlookers from my ill-timed laugh—an older woman with deep lines on her forehead and around her mouth, likely from a life of gossip and criticism—narrowed her eyes at me.

I couldn’t let her mistake my restlessness as being uncomfortable, so I did the only thing I could think to do in the moment. I settled into Adrian’s side a little harder and brought my other hand to the cuff of his suit on the arm resting over mine.

Still feeling the weight of the woman’s shrewd eyes on me, I brought my free, gloved hand up to the fabric of his suit and started toying with it. A low sound, some may even call it a growl, rumbled from Adrian’s throat.

It was as close to a warning as he could give me while we listened to the chair of the Borghese collection talk about their long and storied history.

“Someone’s watching,” I whispered, and I felt his leg relax in acquiescence.

Good, I thought. I wanted to keep exploring. Maybe even make him squirm.

I thumbed the rich, midnight black fabric of the suit jacket, then moved down to feel the smooth, crisp white fabric of the undershirt. As my thumb and forefinger curled around the hem, tugging lightly, something peeked out under it.

The second I paused, Adrian’s leg tensed again. He knew he’d been caught.

Because he had a fuckingtattoohiding behind all that perfect tailoring and expertly shaved face and pressed hair.